i'm the one you tell your fears to
by MCHammerfell
Summary: You drink hot sauce in your vodka because the pain and the tears are something you caused. Angsty drabble fic, yay. Trigger warning


Author's Note: Here, have some angst. There's no Faberry endgame, but this is exploring Quinn's feels and how her story will likely play out. (Thanks, Ryan. You're awesome.) Hopefully it won't suck too bad. Reviews are nice, love and hate. This is mostly AU, and pretty sad. Also, trigger warning for abortion and minor self-harm.

_One: Welcome to Third Grade._

It's the beginning of third grade when she walks into the classroom with two men-one tall and dark, and the other small and pale-to attend McKinley Elementary's third grade orientation. She's wearing a light pink dress with white frills around the collar, and her hair's in pigtails. She's cute, you think, completely disagreeing with Santana when she whispers, "Look how ugly her nose is!" It's cute, you muse, and it fits her face. You want to be her friend immediately.

_Two: Jade._

"Hi, I'm Lucy," you chirp, approaching the new girl-_Rachel Barbra Berry, future star!-_with a skip in your step. She's standing alone on the playground, away from the kids playing Tag and running around the slides. She's completely enamored by something on the tree in front of her, and when she hears your voice, she jumps with an adorable shriek. Her head swings around in shock, her mouth already open to yell at you. When she notices it's _you_, however, she blushes and closes her mouth tightly, hiding her face behind her bangs. You decide then that she's much like a kitten in her mannerisms. Why a kitten comes to mind, you have no idea, but it fits.

"H-hello," she whispers shyly, shuffling her feet to avoid looking at you. You smile lightly and ask, "What'cha lookin' at there?"

Her head snaps up and she smiles widely, so wide her face might break, you concur. She bounces towards the tree, pointing to a small, furry creature.

"This is my friend, Jade. She's a caterpillar," she says matter-of-factly, like it isn't totally weird to be friends with an insect. You step closer to examine her 'friend', noting its-_her-_yellow and black spots and little fuzzy hairs.

"She's gonna be a butterfly one day, y'know," Rachel quips, rocking on her heels excitedly. "She'll turn into a cocoon first, like a little grey ball, and she'll sleep for a long time. But when she wakes up, she'll break out and be a big, beautiful butterfly!" You raise an eyebrow, not understanding how this little thing can become a butterfly. You find yourself asking Rachel all kinds of questions-_"How does it change?" "Where does the caterpillar part go?" "Why can't it turn into something else?"-_and she answers every single one with glee, looking into your eyes instead of at the ground or the tree or anywhere else, unlike all your other friends. You decide then that you want her to be your best friend, not Santana, because she's nice to you and she's also prettier. You smile at your decision, and Rachel looks confused.

"You're gonna be my best friend," you giggle, and Rachel just nods, smiling back at you. This is the first best day of your life.

_Three: It's Just a Skinned Knee, Rach._

In eighth grade, while everyone is growing and changing, you're still stuck in your seven-year-old mindset, wanting your stuffed lion more than a boyfriend and juice boxes more than the alcohol some of your friends have started drinking. You and Rachel, much to your friends' chagrin, are extremely close and never part. Santana's pleas for you to 'go out and party' with her are met with 'Rach and I are gonna watch the Lion King 2 this weekend.' You can tell she'd sick of you two, but you can't bring yourself to care. When you and Rachel are together, all you do is smile and laugh and feel all warm and fuzzy in your tummy. The weekend you've chosen to watch the Lion King 2 together, you've set out everything necessary: lots of blankets and pillows, popcorn, apple juice boxes, and Reggie the Lion to join your cuddles. You stare out your window for nearly two hours, waiting for Rachel to skip up the sidewalk and greet you.

"Quinn, what are you doing?" your mother asks, giving you a peculiar look. You turn and smile widely, answering with, "Waiting for Rachel!" She dismisses herself without a word, walking off to God-knows-where. You continue your watching, and when Rachel comes up the sidewalk in her light blue dress and bouncing ponytail, you fly towards the door, ripping it open and sprinting down the steps. Rachel beams at you, watching you speed towards her; however, as you near the bottom step, you step wrong and suddenly you're reeling towards the pavement, reaching out to catch yourself with your hands. You crash into the sidewalk, hearing a shriek before you feel a sharp pain in your knees and wrists.

"Quinn!" Rachel cries, and she's by your side immediately. Her soft hands find your shoulders and helps you up, careful not to hurt you. When you wince, she gasps and apologizes profusely.

"I'm okay," you say softly, glancing at your bloody, swollen knees. There's asphalt speckled in with the blood, little black and grey dots. "It's just a skinned knee, Rach," you tell her, but that doesn't stop her from leaning down and kissing both of your wounded knees and both of your scraped hands and (most likely) sprained wrists. It definitely doesn't stop the butterflies in your tummy from going absolutely insane.

_Four: Pro-Choice._

It's junior year when Puck gets you drunk on apple wine coolers and more than a little high with his cheap, smothering cologne. He takes you to bed, and for all the talk he talks, it isn't pleasant. At all. When he's done, you roll over and cry until your body gives out and you pass out. The next two weeks are absolute hell, the memory of sweaty hands and inhumane grunts plaguing your mind. When your period is late, you don't freak out too bad-periods are weird, especially with your intense Cheerio workout regime-and continue with your day. The seventh day it's late, you cry. You sob as you drive to the pharmacy to buy the pregnancy test, and when the little blue plus sign fades into your view, you vomit. Your stomach turns inside out and leaves you empty. Well, not completely. Now there's a _person_ inside of you. A growing, breathing child. You're sick all night, every time you think of the fact that Puck's seed is inside of you. You debate texting Rachel-_I need you, right now, please-_but you just lie in your bed full of sorrow.

When the sun peaks through your curtains, you've yet to sleep. Your red, swollen, empty eyes turn to the clock; 5:39. You should get up, shower, get dressed, go to school, but you have other ideas. You glance at the door of your bedroom, wondering how far into the depths of Hell you'll go for this. When you decide that Satan'll likely tear you from limb to limb slowly, you sigh and get up anyway.

When you've finished and the nurses at the clinic give you the OK, you walk out into the afternoon sun, slightly sore and remarkably empty. Your lower half aches. Your chest is broken, you think, because every breath you draw in rattles your lungs and sends acid down your throat. You practically hobble to your car, hoping by some grace of God an eighteen-wheeler blows you off the road. You regret your decisions-going to that stupid party, committing this act of _murder_-immediately, and as you make your way home down a back road, pedal to the metal, you almost swerve into the tree line on purpose. Why shouldn't you?

_'Where are you?'_

Your phone dings, and you can practically hear Rachel's concerned tone. You sigh. This is why you have to stay. You scoop up your phone and decide to just type 'Home.' You hate to blow her off, but honestly, you don't feel like doing anything but sleeping for the next five years. You think not even she could fill this emptiness inside you. You think maybe the drugs they gave you to kill the growth inside of you is rotting you from the inside out. You think (hope) they'll kill you; they said they wouldn't hurt you ("Mild nausea and a stomach ache at the most") but who knows, maybe God feels merciful today. He surely didn't that night.

_'I miss you. Are you okay?'_

Damn you, Rachel. Your heart rate increases exponentially at her words-she misses you?-and you pick up your phone again, typing out 'I'm fine.'

She must have believed you, because she doesn't text back.

_Five: I Would Kill to Be Your Clothes._

It's the beginning of senior year before you come to terms with the fact that you're in love with Rachel. Irrevocably so. She's asked you to help her pack her boxes for after graduation, to which you regretfully agree to. Seeing her in the middle of her room, surrounded by memories of summer movie nights and whispered confessions, makes your breath catch painfully in your throat. She'll be leaving at the end of the year, headed to New York, to NYADA, without you, but with _him. _You're watching her closely, noticing the way she folds her clothes slowly and sporadically-not at all in Rachel fashion. How you wish she'd pack you away to take with her. You've always thought yourself rather perceptive, so when you ask what's wrong and she answers with 'Nothing,' you know she's lying; however, you don't question it further. If she had something to talk about, she could talk to her _husband__. _The word makes you shiver and choke back bile. She'd gotten married in a cramped church on a Thursday afternoon-7:35, to be exact, because it was _scheduled. _Rachel would never want an appointment for her wedding, you think. Rachel would want doves and a Cliffside band and fucking Barbra Streisand to sing a duet with her, but Finn could never, ever give her that.

_You can't either, _the sadistic part of your mind whispers hatefully, and it's like pulling the trigger of the gun pressed to your temple. When you hear Rachel call after you as you flee her house, you can't bring yourself to turn back.

_Six: The Wonder Years (You Wonder How the Hell You Got Here.)_

To be frank, your graduation sucks. Rachel, of course, takes Salutatorian, being beaten only by the quiet redhead in your AP English class. You could practically feel the disdain radiating off of the brunette as the pudgy redhead took the stage. You smile, because you're wrong and not yourself and Rachel _deserves this._

It's hell having to be second best, huh?

Puck's after party is going to be shit, so you blow it off for something a little more your speed-being by yourself, with pot and Keaton Henson. When you're sad, you like to listen to music that makes you even more sad. You've always been a masochist at heart, you think, as the soft guitar and gravelly tones of You Don't Know How Lucky You Are ring through your headphones. You flick your lighter and watch the flame dance in the gentle breeze blowing through your back yard. When it bites at your thumb and burns your flesh, your first instinct is to drop it, but why should you? It's the first pain you've felt that isn't in your chest, and you relish in it, even as your skin boils and bubbles. When you think you've had enough, you let go, your eyes focused on the blister forming. It isn't crying and screaming and it isn't _Rachel _that's hurting you; it's yourself, and you can control that, and you become absolutely power-hungry.

_Seven: Regrets Collects Like Old Friends_

She'd known everything. Almost everything, anyway. (Thinking of telling her gives you headaches.) You'd been through everything with her: Finn, Puck, Finn again, always fucking _Finn. _You'd let her cry and you'd listened to every little thing and now she's probably with him right fucking now, giggling and smiling and being in love. Fuck her.

You're a little drunk.

What did you expect to come from being alone in your dorm at three a.m.? Rebecca had left with her friends, going to some frat party you didn't have the time for.

When you'd remembered the Burnette's packed away in your bag, you jumped at it. Your head was filled with RachelRachelRachel and the vodka burned her away for a while.

(You drink hot sauce in your vodka because the pain and the tears are something _you _caused.)

_Eight: I'm Not Yours Anymore._

In your junior year at Yale, in a quiet coffee shop you frequent now-a coffee addiction is healthier than a liquor addiction, you muse-when you finally stop thinking of Rachel. It's when a tall woman with dark auburn hair walks in that your mind slows down, and when she turns to meet your gaze, the train of thought you've been running on for five years slows to a stop. She smiles at you, a small flash of pearls and a flurry of butterflies you thought had died five years ago. You didn't expect anything but a frappe in here, but here you are, having an impromptu staring contest with a woman that finally makes you forget her.

"Hello," she greets you, and she's somehow in front of you, grinning like an old friend. "I'm Lauren," she says, the wisps of London in her accent. You remember how to work your mouth, smiling a little too wide and replying, "Quinn," a little too loud.

_Nine: Rachel Who?_

"Quinn," Lauren whines, and her pouty face is on in full force.

"Lauren, we've watched Beauty and the Beast six times already," you groan jokingly. (You're in love with the Beauty and the Beast, but even more so with her.)

You think of Rachel occasionally. (Mostly if she's happy or successful-you've yet to hear anything from her in the news or on the radio.) But when Lauren's sad lip comes out and she cuddles into your side, trying to bribe you into watching this for the seventh time, you can't even remember who Rachel is.

"Fine," you relent, smiling lovingly as Lauren squeals and restarts the movie again.

_Ten: Happy Endings Aren't Always the Ones We Want(ed)._

Five months and seven days into your relationship, you tell Lauren you love her. It's over coffee and a blueberry muffin, at 7:34 in the morning, and when you say it, she smiles. Her mouth splits from ear to ear, nearly consuming her face, and when she replies, your heart stops. Hearing the words tumble from her lips breaks open your heart all over again, but she takes the pieces and fits them back together and kisses them until they're healed, not just taped and tacked together. She's gentle when you make love that night, piecing you back together with every kiss and caress, and you've completely forgotten everything before her. When you come undone, it's her name you're screaming, and not _her_ name you're crying brokenly.

~Fin~

_Song References:_

_Now, Now-Wolf_

_Florence & the Machine-Shake It Out_

_Angus and Julia Stone-I'm Not Yours_

_Lorde-Buzzcut Season_

_Many thanks for reading!_


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